Alan Ingalls

Someone I can trust

I’ve been wanting to start blogging more regularly. This seems like a good chance to start. I had a kind of “aha!” moment this weekend. I know, that phrase is becoming kind of cliche, but that’s what it was and I can’t think of a better way to describe it. I was in my office on Saturday afternoon. There were a couple of other people in the building, but apparently I was the only one who heard the front doorbell ring. Having the doorbell ring on a Saturday was decidedly odd. I hate answering the doorbell. I hate trying to decide whether this person-or-persons-unknown has a legitimate reason to be in the building. Eventually I decided to answer the door. There was a group of young people (High School age? Maybe college?) unloading a trailer full of luggage onto the sidewalk. I tried to ask politely who they were and why they wanted into the building. The young man facing me didn’t get it. All I could seem to get out of him was that they–whoever they were–were going to unload this trailer and bring it into the building. I thought that maybe they were a group here for a conference and needed to unload over at one of the dormitory buildings at the college. I tried to remember which conference might be going on this weekend. I tried to rephrase the question. The response was equally cryptic. Then there was a conversation among the group as to why this imbecile (me–they didn’t call me an imbecile, but their tone of voice suggested that they were not happy with me) was not going to let them into the building. I said that I did not know who they were or why they were there. HINT! HINT! Please tell me who you are! I was trying to figure another polite way to get more information when someone called out the name of the group’s leader. He was standing in the parking lot talking on a cell phone. He turned toward us and I immediately recognized him. I still had no clue why he would be unloading luggage into our building, but I didn’t need to. I trusted him. I opened the door and let the group in. Now, I really hope the group doesn’t regard me as rude. I wasn’t trying to be rude. I wasn’t trying to be nosy. Maybe next time I’ll just cower in my office and call security. But in this case knowing the leader made all the difference. You can draw your own Christian applications.